Shortly after the wee hours of the next day, during the time when most revelry had ceased in favor of rest, I secluded myself with Skull in a meditation chamber. I use the word “meditation” loosely, for I hate meditating. However, to enter my inner world, to force myself into The Void, or to enter that strange and seemingly nameless realm with that egg-being that also has given no name, I require a certain amount of tranquility that can be difficult to obtain when around so many people. This chamber in particular is spacious enough for my draconic form. It is also hidden underground in an undisclosed location that is far from prying eyes.
With only sparse clues as to what could happen, Skull and I chose to be naked, with my own person in my human form. The nubs of what will become horns on my head only itch slightly today. I suspect there could be certain “changes”, and so I have taken preparations in this spacious place for whatever way this meeting could unfold.
I don’t really know what “clearing one’s mind” and such is for meditation, but I do take efforts to align all my thoughts of my main mind towards the goal of entering that place where only Emperors–and perhaps their bodyguards and servants–go. In the span of one breath to another, I find success as the world around me changes to a hallway, one full of statues of Emperors past.
Without any delay or fanfare, an overly large and draconic egg rolls from far down the hallway towards Skull and I. Its speed is rather impressive, and it stops just as suddenly as it arrives, which surely would have caused traumatic stress forces on lesser eggs.
Cracks appear in the egg, which gave way to openings through which arms, legs, wings, and a tail emerged, all within their expected positions for an upright being. Additionally, holes appeared for the eyes of the being within, and all the more that could be seen of its form was the golden glow of said eyes. The egg itself transitioned through patterns and colors seemingly of its own whim, or perhaps in a way to reflect the emotions of the being within.
“I’m glad you made it!” the being within the egg announced. “You may have noticed by now that there has been a moratorium on you getting new [Deeds] and the like.”
That statement, while entirely factual, was indeed an understatement, but I decided to play it off as trivial.
“It crossed my desk once or twice,” I responded dryly. “It would be agreeable if we could clear up that matter.”
“Ah, well, you see,” the egg-being continued as it gesticulated to diagrams and charts it manifested into the air with illusions. “There has been some discrepancies concerning your actual age and you your apparent age, and how those play into your [Age], and with you making all these companions that tie into your person and Blessing, and I had to consult the rules and guidelines for how to handle that, and then there was your other self that you merged with that existed before you did and…” The eggshell took on a rosy color where the cheeks would have been as the entity within realized that it had been rambling.
“Ahem. Well, there had been some complications that had to be addressed. I suppose I should start with some good news.”
Skull and I stared at him with passive smiles on our faces to politely encourage him to get to the point.
“The jurisdiction gets tricky for Skull, since she is partially yours and partially Gulthar’s. I guess you timeshare her or something. Either way, the paperwork has finished processing, and we have hashed out an agreement for her to be promoted to Diamond.”
This is indeed good news, especially if one glosses over how some measure of insult could be taken from the beginning of his explanation, even if it is accurate. However, by the way it waits for me to respond, I suspect there is more to it.
“But…” I drawled out.
“But,” the egg-being continued. “There has to be a slight change to accommodate that. As you may have realized, Skull is currently a human, but she is also a [Dragon Knight] in service of you. That is a Blessing normally associated with-” it paused as its eyes wandered upwards and to the side as if in thought “-dragonkin, dragonborn, half-dragons… Whatever the polite word for them is this era. The long and short of it is that Skull needs to change her race to accommodate truly tapping into that. Now, there are several versions to choose from-”
“Back up a second,” Skull interrupted. “What does that entail?”
The egg entity straightened up as much as an egg could before it continued.
“Right, you probably don’t have much experience with that. Half-dragons have fallen out of style considering they are not inherently loyal to their parent dragon. You actually have to care about them and invest in their futures and happiness to try to align their actions and behaviors with your own ambitions,” it continued as it rolled its eyes. “Who has time for that?
“Anyway, as ways go, you will still look mostly human, but you will have the horns, wings, tail, and eyes similar to that of a dragon, all as a minimum. You can opt in to having patches of scales on your body, and some even prefer it for the whole of their body and a more draconic head or face. It comes with most of the perks of being human and of being a dragon at that same time, which is an increase in power across the board. You may also have some draconic tendencies, but that comes with the territory. Gulthar has already picked a few design patterns that he thinks you will like.”
The egg-being stood there, looking at us expectantly, its gaze darting back and forth between us.
“Then I guess that I accept and that I should review those designs.”
“Egg-cellent!” the egg-being said with a chuckle at his timeless joke. “Your boss here is getting much of the same treatment, as older dragons in their mortal forms are physiologically similar to half-dragons. Gulthar did pick out some designs for him, but I don’t believe he has to commit to them.”
“Oh,” Skull nearly chirped as they talked about me right in front of me. “I have to see those!
“My thoughts-” it paused while examining our expressions for a moment -”eggsactly. My assistant will take you to a morphatorium.
“What assistant?” Skull asked.
“Hello” came another voice as Skull jumped three feet into the air. The assistant in question had somehow snuck up on us despite our Skills to increase our prowess in terms of observing our surroundings. “Please follow me, ma’am.” the assistant, some mix of a kobold and a dragon whelp, continued.
A passage appeared in the wall beside us between the nearly endless row of statues. Skull and the assistant passed through it, and the wall closed up after their passing.
“Now then,” the egg-being continued, “we should get down to stuff about you.”
I had been waiting rather patiently, and a certain part of my draconic pride rankled about being second fiddle, but I suppressed such immature thoughts and focused on the goal.
“I do agree that there is merit in such an undertaking. By all means, do elaborate.”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
We continued to stand there in the middle of the hallway instead of retiring to comfortable accommodations. The egg-being rattled off all kinds of details as it rambled and perhaps talked about things best left unsaid, but I did glean the salient points.
The first truth had already been mentioned; I would be getting much the same physiological treatment as Skull. As we spoke, I tasked one of my minds towards the task of finalizing the design that I had previously prepared for such an eventuality, with my compliments to Bonpricha for the earlier advice on that matter.
Furthermore, I had some points or currency to spend on more Focuses for my flight, to compliment the ones I already had. This currency had been obtained from a culmination of [Age], my various [Deeds], and as a reward for the raid. As a review, I already had [Enchanting], [Material Arcane Science], and [Spatial Manipulation] for my Greater, Intermediate, and Lesser focuses. They offered me a respectable kit to earn myself a tidy profit, to pursue my ambitions in shaping the world, and to generally keep myself entertained.
However, I had noticed that there were certain shortcomings in what they allowed me to do. There were a number of matters that I could not address in terms of scale or scope, for I was not all-powerful. Fortunately, I could take Specialized Focuses that further narrowed down the scope of what they offered, all at a reduced price. I perused the catalog of what was on offer, not that it was by any means exhaustive, if my lessons with Bonpricha and Nanu were accurate.
However, I had already found what I wanted, and so I finagled a budget that I could stomach to get the most of what my greed demanded. The first issue was rather paramount from both a financial and humanitarian perspective.
The world’s roads were mine; that much the gods and the mortal powers had conceded, at least on my continent. However, people tend to not use said roads when said people are missing limbs. Due to the war with The Devourers, there were hundreds of thousands of people that just didn’t get the level of healing they needed to replace missing limbs, as the number of healers that can regenerate missing body parts is comparatively low when related to demand.
Furthermore, while I can make some amazing prosthetics with my current Focuses, I have no reasonable way to integrate them with the flesh and blood of mortal bodies. There is a big difference between a peg leg attached to the end of a stump and a fully integrated new limb that connects to and enhances existing musculature. While I could make a lot of money selling prosthetics, I can earn far more loyalty by returning the lives to cripples. For some reason, there is a trend that it is okay to send men and women to war, but it is also excusable to not care for their broken bodies, loss of livelihood, and purpose in life after the dust settles.
Maybe this is a certain manifestation of my draconic pride, but I cannot abide people being used as tools, only to cast them aside when they are no longer of use. Morality and empathy aside, for me, it would display a certain level of incompetence or poverty that I could not and would not restore my mortal servants to their former glory after the ravages of battle have had their way with flesh and bone.
As such, the answer was abundantly clear. I needed an Intermediate Focus for [Biomancy], but that in and of itself was too expensive, especially considering what I wanted to use it for. Ergo, I selected [Biomancy (Prosthetics)] as a Specialized Intermediate Focus. My first act would be to snub the other powers of the world by using it to care for their forgotten soldiers for free. And while I would not need to explicitly demand that those individuals serve me in turn, there is something about restoring sight to a blind man via new peepers that really puts in a good word for you when trying to align him to your cause.
With that matter settled, I had a more pervasive issue: food. I simply cannot get enough [Farmers] of sufficient quality to meet demand, and the cost of feeding my populace is staggering. Bylo’selhi’s flight is making a killing off of sales of food and sundries to my cities. Now, it may seem like I should have taken Intermediate [Biomancy] as a whole, but trust me, it was still cheaper to take [Biomancy (Production)] to meet my needs. “Production” in this sense is concerned with food, extracts, textiles, and the other normal components that living things make. I am not trying to make a bull into a minotaur with poison spore pods on its back or anything like that. And, for all of this, intent matters when it comes to using these Specialized Focuses, as abusing their use comes with consequences.
Finally, I upgraded [Spatial Manipulation] from Lesser to Intermediate. There is so much more I want to do with portals and teleportation, and short of literally holding someone’s hand while teleporting between shrines, trying to do things along those lines is expensive. Additionally, while I use pocket dimensions all the time to make containers that can hold more stuff than they physically could, I have discovered that there are any number of [Spatial Thief] Blessings out there that can steal from them. Upping security against dimensional theft is paramount, as at least one quarter of goods goes missing on some of high-volume trade routes. I can only hunt thieves down so fast, and even then, only if I have the means to know who is doing it.
I am very much looking forward to the murdering of said thieves. Personally. Viscerally.
My choices made, the egg-being continued talking to me.
“Very good, very good. All seems to be in order here. However, a certain Titan by the name of Hercules has left a message and boon for you.” The egg-being pulled out a rolled up scroll from behind his back (which is probably a withdrawal from a pocket dimension), unfurled it, and began reading.
“Favored Emperor, you have fulfilled the terms of our accord in restoring the One True Moon to her rightful beauty in the firmament. I bequeath unto you my boon. Use it responsibly or face my ire. So do I, Hercules, Firstborn of my kind and Titan of this world, grant unto thee my boon.”
“Huh,” the egg-being muttered. “That was surprisingly and refreshingly brief for the old windbag. Perhaps his better half advised him in the art of brevity.”
I maintained a diplomatically neutral smile at the pot calling the kettle black.
“Well, here you go then,” the egg-being continued unceremoniously as he tossed me something intangible.
What arrived was a packet of Skills, some of which were deeds. For example, [Master of Hydra-kind] allowed me to order around any sort of Hydra, particularly True Hydras, like The Boys and their kin, but also other Hydra creatures like those dogs with three heads. [Master Hydra Tamer - Bestowment] allowed me to grant a boon unto others that they may tame hydras, even if their Blessing would not permit it. Obviously, I would have to use that responsibly, as hydras are difficult to keep fed and have at least as many personalities as they do heads. It also came with a whole host of knowledge about hydras, and somehow, it enlightened me on some facts that I had overlooked.
For starters, hydras can’t swim. Considering how wild hydras spend much of their time in water, that fact surprised me. It would explain why The Boys spend most of their time near shore. At times, they would hold their breath and walk across the bottom of a body of water to get somewhere else, but I had always assumed that was just them showing off.
Furthermore, while hydras are good at regeneration of wounds, it works fundamentally different from how dragons do things. While there exists an appreciable level of parity for the end results for hydras and dragons, dragons use mana for regeneration since dragons are fundamentally creatures of magic, whereas hydras use some mana but mostly brute force it with reserves of food. With that clarity, it makes sense why hydras need so much food, as severed necks and their replacements rot away rather quickly in most cases, which makes that biomass unusable to the hydra.
I had thought that wild hydras were more territorial than they actually are, which is perhaps true in swamps. However, those in rivers and lakes are highly cooperative, such that they spread out to man every inch of the shore so that no prey can find a way to safely get access to the water. Considering how my cities need water and how securing water rights can be politically tricky, there may be some way to garner a free security system with a cadre of hydras at my disposal.
While I mused on this new knowledge, the egg-being motioned me towards the proverbial door as Skull rejoined us.
“It was wonderful having you here again, but I still need to talk to a few more Emperors. You activated the Isolation Protocol, which is going to cause a lot more paperwork and lead to interesting times. Don’t believe the nonsense about wearing your clothes inside out.”
I didn’t know what he meant, and neither did Skull, but with a final shooing motion, we took the hint to take our leave. The process of departure was less of physical motion and more of a mental desire to return to reality.
That proved to be a terrible idea.
There wasn’t a whole lot of time between arriving back to the waking world and the arrival of bearable, albeit immensely uncomfortable, pain. Skull looked to have it far worse, for a lot of stuff changed on her insides as organs were rearranged or discarded entirely for superior variants. Together, we writhed on the floor in a most undignified manner as decades or centuries of slow growth manifested all at once for me, and a full makeover for her.
While I could hide away my draconic features in my new form, it would be rather uncomfortable to suddenly lose limbs. However, this was the new Skull, whether she wanted it or not, so her days of blending in with the masses (as much as her imposing self could anyway) are over.
“I feel,” Skull started as she took another heaving breath while she started to slowly rise from the floor, “powerful.”
And this, too, was an understatement.
